SL Burnout

I'll add my voice to everyone else's... I definitely burn out from time to time. Sometimes SL feels like Second Job and I'm not always in the mood to work, even though it's work that I truly enjoy. It doesn't worry me though because it's a cycle I've gone through many times already. Sometimes I just pull back for a couple of months and do other stuff... read, spend time outdoors, work on my RL house, get busy with RL work. Sooner or later some bit of creative inspiration takes hold and I'm right back to logging in every day excited by a new project. I'm glad that's how it is for me and that I'm not a hardcore addict all the time. It seems healthier to me this way.

In any other MMO I've been hardcore about, it would last about six months and then I'd hit a wall of "what the hell am I doing here?" feelings and that would be that. I'd quit and not look back. Two years of SL and I have every reason to expect I'll be here at least two more. It's because I can burn out, walk away for a bit, and come back anew that I know I can stick with SL over the long haul.

David,

I hear you loud and clear. I have just gone through this myself. I had taken a month break from SL, only to log into answer customer IM's.

I have come back refreshed and started new projects( I shake my head thinking.. I take to much on)

I also created an alt to escape, to see SL from a new view.


Take a break! Its the best advice I can give

((Hugss))

~Tya

Yup, burnout has been simmering on my back burner for quite awhile time, now. No gumption to do much of anything in SL.

Here's an observation, though. Don't you find it odd that burnout seems to hit "the world" more than "the forums?" There are a number of folks, myself included, who remain engaged within the forum realm even when burned out on SL, itself.

My current remedy is to re-create my identity as an obnoxious blingtard. I find that confrontational, irrational humor does my body good -- and considering that I'm lactose intolerant, it's a healthy alternative to dairy!

Lastly, tinies are the death knell of SL (I made a funny!). If someone could please point me in the direction of a steam roller in SL...

Wow!!! This is my kind of POST!!!!

OMG, people feel like me...!!

David, David, where are you to give you a hug? Chip? All the ones out there that have been in this game for a year or more and have done almost everything but there still lots to learn but when you go to SL is like, now what???

I can do this, but why? Then you stand in the same place at your home and think... Lets buy land!! That is fun!! But for what???

Lets design!! yes yes!! Then you open a template and is like ok now what? Should I really want to mess with this now!!!

Ahhh, lets go to a club and dance! Cool!!, Wait I am here in this club now what?? Put my little avie to dance and watch and get stuck?

Well, I think I have done a lot in SL... I opened a great and successful modeling agency. Helped designers showcase and help people became models and fulfill that desire. I am happy and I know what I did and I know I was happy with the outcome of it and people knew what I had. But got burnout and was time to close and I know was a good decision because I felt like I had too.

Do I miss it??? of course, was my life in SL... Would I do it again, SURE!! Fashion is my life and I might come back and do it...

Now it is the time for others to show what they have, for those new people that want to do the same.

But I am so burn out!!! I am looking for more and something, but what? Well, WoW has been my escape and it is fun even if others say is childish and stupid game. But the game is not "emotional" and makes me smile which is important.

But I don't think SL is the same. Before wasn't that big and when you went to an event you knew the same people. Now so many new people or not even knew but alts. So many malls, so many designers, so many this and that... It is not just the same. The grid is so but so big, I can't even decide what is next to do.

Do I want to leave SL? Noo!!! SL can be fun... But the question is...

I like vanilla ice cream, would I eat vanilla ice cream every day and every hour because has a great taste? Of course not!!!

How about chocolate ice cream now? Or strawberry? lol

I tried the little rabbit avatar and the little kittie, but it is not me. I get stuck in IM's still people asking me the same questions.

Did I have great relationships in SL? Sure, I had a great time with each and they are all friends, well not like before but they are friends. And that is what it counts.

I still have a wonderful partner who makes me laugh and have fun in SL. Now when he is in SL he is my moment, when he is not... I try to escape now.

I really had enough of SL.... burnout, but it is still fun, just not now 18 hours of SL, but down to 2 some days, a bit more on others. But now I don't get desperate when I can't log in or there is down time!! COOL!!!

I am getting healed!!

Yah people all make me laugh.

You're so ready to decry anyone who thinks SL needs to change it ways, but in terms of real SL dedication .. yeah right, only if it's the right time of month?

But, not surprising. Bandwagon critics, bandwagon fans.

Look, if you don't want to be in SL then please go somewhere else and whine about it.

Your contribution of that information here is of very little use as far as I can see.

You sound burn out too blaze!!! lol that is a sign!!

Well, I do need to reprioritize at times depending on various activities in my life, be they family, work, friends, or other interests.

However, really - this is all OFF TOPIC. If you don't want to be in SL, fine, you don't need to come in here and start bragging about it.

I mean, christ. What does this have to do with anything?

I think somebody has a case of the Wednesdays!

yes.. Blaze you ok??, you seem burnout... We didn't say we don't like it, did we? We like SL...

Just burn out.. like you now... you seem tired... calm down hun...

Blaze, look at all the post you have done to forums, that is why you might be burn out hehe...

I do not think bragging is what is being done. It is simply people sharing their thoughts with others. The forums sort of *are* a place for that to happen. And those who have had burnout *do* love SL. They are just overexerting themselves and need to take a step back. The same thing happens in RL. But no one is bragging about anything. I can't even see where you would be able to apply that word as there is nothing arrogant or boastful about sharing feelings of burnout.

I'm not burned out right now myself. I'm fired and ready to roll, but I have been there. It never changed my feelings about SL or the people in it. I just needed my own vacation and then I was ready to come back refreshed.

And this thread is *very* ON TOPIC as it relates directly to feelings about Second Life. Personally it just seems to me like you are trying to pick a fight.

Ah there it is, back to playing the role of mini-forum moderator. If it is not a thread you can somehow manipulate or get a plug into, then you call for it to be moved. Now when you were promoting furniture the other day, not a word out of you about where the thread belonged.

Why are you so bothered by people discussing feeling a sense of malaise about SL? A lot of people are experiencing it. It is not bragging, it is speaking freely. Here you are trying to suppress an idea you don't agree with. Hypocrite much?

Blaze, how is this off topic?

We are having a general discussion about Second Life and how it can turn into work in the "General Forum". No one said they dont like SL, I notice you often turn something someone is saying into a different meaning.

You preach in all your threads "Please stay on topic or dont participate". But yet, you jump in this discussion to just critisize people for having a conversation? I think Cristiano is correct, I smell a hypocrite.

the cool thing about sl burnout is that unlike other games, when you start playing again a few months later, it's a whole new world to explore.

Yes!! And your friends are not 20 levels above you so you can't hang out together anymore. Always hated that about taking breaks from MMORPGs.

I wouldn't give him enough credit to be a hypocrite.. it's just blaze being blaze... If you say white, he says black, you say up, he says down.

He is a self confessed alt, and 'forum gamer' with no real opinion - only one diametrically opposed to what people seem to have in common, and not enough conviction to put an identity to those thoughts..

Nothing to see here, just skip the posts and move along.

Siggy

In the case of a SL Burnout (I too) am in suffering in the midst of it. I'm moving towards WoW to see if I can take a break for awhile.

I know the fact that SL does indeed change. It needs to in order to keep itself alive and well. Along with most other MMORPGs (although SL isn't classified as one).

As a builder, I continually try and fail, get frustrated, with all the constant day to day bugs that never seem to get fixed (hoping one day they might). The prim limits are absolutely frustrating as well. Where as I understand the need for LL to place limits on the sims and clients abilities, I feel SL is capable of doing a lot more (as everyone else does). But I expect too much, and receive so little. Yes patience is needed for these kinds of things (I've been waiting forever for streaming audio).

Also another factor of the burnout: I too am like David, I am opposed to making any sort of money due to my expertise in any area. I create things for fun, on my own time schedule, not anyone elses. Not really here to please anyone. The economy seems to be the main driven factor in most cases within SL, for I (rarely) see anything of such things that happened randomly 'just because' no incentives, just for pure enjoyment.

I have many many ideas for SL, but SL isn't capable of running them yet a lot of them are too ambitious, for those, I do have to be patient to wait my turn, but for David, I do sympathize.

Cheers.
Einsman

Haven't yet read the entire thread, but I want to post this before it gets too long (as if it isn't already):
Those waddling little tinies – they are just terrific, aren’t they! I had a moment on the game the other night, when my friend from another game, where we are different avatars,and I were working out the height passage for my Tiny Cottages. Tthere we were, all serious and working hard and everything, when I noticed that we were actually two squirrels waddling around. Hilarious!

Reasons for burnout experienced by older players:

Growing pains. That was then, and this is now. It’s always rough; I have two teenage girls and I hate to see the stages pass, and know I will never get them back again. One must just try to to look to the future and anticipate with joy and expectancy the stages to come and the new and different pleasures those will bring. Which you could never get, if you stayed in the one stage forever.

Personal time on the game. Spend two years at anything, and especially at any online game or environment, you’re just going to have these periods of feeling wiped out. It just can’t ever again be new for you the way it is for newer players. That’s one reason why I always like to have at least two games going for myself at any given time.

Builder’s Burnout: Tedium – it’s the name of the game when it comes to building. There is SUCH a wide gap between what you envision and the finished product. You can easily spend an hour or two getting just one detail right. Then there’s the mis-click – where you unlink your whole build instead of that one part, for instance – that adds even more time to the project. As you progress, you begin to understand exactly what all the build will entail before you even begin, including all the hours of tedium at the tedious parts, and the inevitable mis-click that will happen somewhere along the line. Or just – something that isn’t even predictable – a piece of the build that decided to make itself noncopyable for no reason whatsoever, for instance, that you have to track down and replace before you can mark the item for sale. ONCE you figure out that that kind of thing can even happen, randomly, and will. All this is the result of the current building technology – tedious, unwieldy, and full of bugs. Then again, that’s what makes only a few people actually stick with building, so it's actually good for us!

Changes in game design: Changes that make things cost more, and bring less benefit to those wishing to provide things for their entertainment or creativity value.

Forum battles: They do damage our enjoyment of the game. I’ve always been pretty good at keeping a game and its forums separate in my mind, but I often fail at that, and it seems to color the whole game, which really shouldn’t happen.

Reaching these sorts of impasses isn’t a bad thing, though. As others have said, it makes you all of a sudden remember some of those rl hobbies and activities you have been neglecting. It’s also usually a sign to try something different in game, as others have suggested.

Just as you older players sometimes wistfully yearn for the early days, I, a younger player, often wistfully wish I had been there. (Which I wasn’t, thanks only to no cable.) I think of how much fun it would have been to create something and have people get excited, have a closer-knit group, build the place from the ground up, all of that.

Overall, though, this game hasn’t reached its time for ANYONE to fade, older or newer players. Nowhere near its time. Especially not you, David!

(P.S. Calliandris, I so understand that all-hands-on-deck thingie! I’m exactly the same way with my girls – pay for some jobs; some are just expected; and sometimes it’s just let’s get ‘er done! Lol! It's good to know other moms are the same way I am.)

coco

P.S. Now that I've read everything - good point, Jauni! about the game being changed, and Pendari, about the levels.

Amen to this post. I've been AWOL for a heckuva long time now. I just recently purchased some new land after selling a while back... I'm just hoping the few ideas I've gathered keep me interested enough to login once in a while.

David, I remember that one T and D game. There was a who's who of it's day, IMHO. It was a lot of fun. I still have a picture of me, nude next to a woman from/in Jessie... There definitely was a different sense of community back then, maybe it speaks more of how new SL was to me at the time, dunno. I miss the Erotic Poetry and Limmericks as well. Say hi to Alana for me

Awww David, sorry you're feeling burnt. The sheep in the trailer park would miss you. Erogenous Zones was a great mag. I still cherish the very hot picture you took of Ferran, Emma, and I for that one issue.

I know the burn out feeling. Sometimes I give up on meeting new like minded people. Those who want to do creative stuff as well as hang out. Mostly it's my own fault because I'm in Chaos so much immersed in some project.

My close friends in SL though have been a real anchor for me as my RL goes into uncharted water. Living in a new city, job hunting, leaving my RL friends, general uncertainity over the future have all been lessened by being able to log on. SL is a real life saver right now.

I wanted to say thanks for the thread...alot of what was said, I find myself going through.
Somedays I cannot bring myself to login, so I do not...I am not sure I know why really...I have loved, lost, shopped, not, and still enjoy people...but I am finding more meanness, more oh my god, not dancing , or tringo or slingo again..oh lord another sl wedding...I am just not able to summon my joy...and I thank everyone for listening..and hearing that others are going through the same thing, does help.

Amazing to see that so many people are feeling the same way that I have for many many months. I rarely see any of the people I used to hang out with logging on. We used to have so much fun acting totally stupid. *Hugs you all*